Макс Коллинз - Road to Purgatory

Michael slammed a hand on the table — hard.

But Ness didn’t jump. Or even blink.

“And all the time you knew — knew ‘King’ Capone was a drooling imbecile.”

Silence held the room for perhaps thirty seconds. Michael felt himself trembling and hoped it didn’t show. Ness seemed a statue.

Then finally the G-man said, “We didn’t know. We suspected — medical projections were made, based upon his condition when he was released, back in ’39. But until right now... we weren’t sure.”

“Hell, you oughta put Big Al’s puss on a poster and hang that up in all the barracks, and show GIs what VD really can do.”

“...It’s an idea.”

Michael snorted a nonlaugh and sat back and folded his arms. “So. I’ve fulfilled my mission, then.”

“You have accomplished a major portion of it, at least. You’ve confirmed my theory that Frank Nitti has maintained his control over the syndicate by perpetuating the fiction that Capone was ruling from afar.”

Twitching a smile, Michael said, “Haven’t you veered slightly off course, Mr. Ness? Aren’t you supposed to be protecting military bases and defense plants from painted women?”

Ness gestured with an open hand — vaguely conciliatory. “Your sarcasm aside, Michael, that is indeed my job — but I’m also part of a coordinated effort by various government agencies to put the Capone bunch out of business.”

“You think stopping Frank Nitti is a good idea.”

“Don’t you?”

Michael shrugged one shoulder. “Nitti’s not the worst man in his world.”

Ness’s eyes at once widened and tightened. “You can’t be serious — what the hell kind of ‘world’?”

Calmly, Michael said, “A legitimate world, within ten years, if Nitti has his way. Get rid of him and you’re looking at Paul the Waiter Ricca — and psychos like Stefano and Giancana, mad dogs up from the street. It’ll mean decades of gambling and whores and loansharking and narcotics. Capone’ll seem like Walt Disney.”

The federal agent sat silent, stunned by this onslaught of words, coming from the normally taciturn Michael.

Finally, Ness said, “Your father thought John Looney was the best man in their world. And look what it got him.”

Michael snapped, “Frank Nitti is not John Looney, and I’m not my father.”

“Are you sure?”

Michael said nothing.

Ness looked pale; almost sick. “You’ve... you’re not the kid I sent in, Michael. Maybe I made a mistake.”

This time Michael’s laugh did have humor in it — dark humor. “What, I’m infected now? You oughta have access to penicillin, if anybody does.”

Still wearing that stricken expression, Ness said, “You need to understand, Michael. Undercover work has unique pitfalls. You can easily become part of the universe you’ve insinuated yourself into.”

“If you don’t, Mr. Ness, you get killed.”

With a sigh, the fed said, “I know that. I know that.” Ness became suddenly business-like. “So I’m pulling the plug on you, Michael. This relationship is over.”

Surprised that he cared, Michael said defensively, “Swell. What should I tell Frank Nitti, thanks for the summer job? Think I’ll head back to DeKalb and toss pizza?”

Ness’s expression and voice seemed earnest. “Michael... you’ll find the moment. Ease yourself out. It’s not like you’re a made man.”

Michael said nothing.

Ness’s eyes froze.

And when Ness next spoke, his voice was almost a whisper, as if he could barely bring himself to say any of this out loud. “Oh Christ... Then you did kill Abatte, in Calumet City. Self-defense, I know, ‘hypothetical,’ you said, but... Michael, we have to get you out of there.”

“And where would I go? Bataan, maybe?”

Ness was shaking his head, looking for words that weren’t presenting themselves.

“You said it yourself, Mr. Ness. Our relationship is over... Are we done here?”

Michael sat in a wooden chair against a wall in the big waiting-room area on the first floor of the station, with four rough-looking juvies waiting for their parents to come take them home.

Finally, Estelle came down the wide wooden stairs, unaccompanied; in that conservative suit, she again looked almost prim, if shellshocked. Gratefully she took Michael’s arm as he led her into the cool dark of early morning.

Michael walked her down the block to an all-night diner, where he called for a cab. Then he sat in a window booth next to her, waiting for the ride; they both had coffee.

“What did Drury want?” he asked her.

“He’s working with Ness, you know.”

“Yeah, I gathered.”

In the pretty face, her upper lip curled back nastily. “Hundreds of bent cops in this town, you wouldn’t think one honest flatfoot could cause so much trouble.”

She meant Drury. But it applied to Ness as well. And without the cooperation of an honest copper like Drury, the G-man could never have executed a raid like tonight’s.

Michael said, “They’re shuttering the Colony.”

“I know. I know.” She leaned forward, the anxiety in her eyes terrible to behold; she reached out and clutched one of his hands. “Mike, please talk to Mr. Nitti. Tell him this wasn’t my fault. I didn’t know anything about those damn jewel thieves, and—”

“It’ll be fine, baby.”

She shook her head, blonde hair askew. “You don’t understand — the feds, they’re squeezing me. They want to pull me in as a witness on this movie-extortion business.”

“What do you know about it?”

“Not much.”

But she didn’t sound convincing; she had been Nicky Dean’s mistress, after all, and bagman Dean was already doing time in the Hollywood case. Michael had overheard Campagna and Nitti expressing concern the hood might be bargaining for a shorter sentence by singing.

And not in the way Estelle sang at the club, either...

“I’m not going to cooperate, Michael. I told Drury less than nothing. But if the Outfit boys even think I might be spilling... You gotta talk to Frank for me! ”

“I will,” he said gently. “I will.”

The cab arrived, and Michael took Estelle to his suite at the Seneca. In bed, he held her all night long, and she shivered as if she were cold or perhaps had the flu. Only it wasn’t cold in the penthouse, and she was a healthy girl.

For now.

For the half year following Michael’s initiation into the Chicago Outfit, the made man’s life proceeded in a nonviolent, routine manner.

At times he felt as if he’d wandered out of reality and onto a Hollywood soundstage. After all, his girlfriend looked like a movie star, screwed him silly on a regular basis, and made upon him no demands whatsoever. His apartment — appointed in a contemporary manner, all browns and greens — had a bedroom, living room, kitchenette, and a balcony view of the city. While he worked long hours, he for the most part sat around, reading magazines and novels, receiving a two-hundred-dollar-a-week check, for accounting purposes, and eight hundred cash, for his own.

He dined out at top restaurants, from Don the Beachcomber’s to Henrici’s, and here at the Seneca Hotel, owned by Outfit investors, his meals, drinks, everything, was (like his suite) comped. A free ride at most nightspots was waiting, too, from the Chez Paree to the Mayfair Room. He wore custom suits from a Michigan Avenue haberdashery attuned to the special needs of the well-armed gentleman about town; and a company car was his on off hours, ration tickets no problem. And like any good American, he bought war bonds.

As he floated through this easy, vaguely exciting life, directionless, empty, yet numbly content, only a few times a day did Michael feel pangs of... not conscience, exactly, more like twinges. Twinges of character.